Tuesday, October 07, 2003

This work is supremely important to our ultimate success. It is largely being carried out by aggressive young commissioned and non-commissioned officers, men and women in their late 20s and early 30s, who every day go out into the villages, towns and cities, meeting the sheiks, the town councils and the mayors.

Far from Baghdad and around the country, these soldiers truly are the face of America for most Iraqis. But their story doesn't seem to interest reporters, editors or TV producers.

It isn't all ambushes and roadblocks here. There are risks. But there are also opportunities, because there is a generation of Iraqis who know what repression means and who welcome the opportunity to build something better for themselves and their children. Our soldiers have shared meals with them, tea with them, photographs and trinkets with them. So there's hope for Iraq and for the Americans here.